Brooks too wide for our leaping, hedges far to high. Loads too heavy for our moving, burdens too cumbersome for us to bear. Distances far beyond our journeying. The horse gave us mastery.

The trouble with sharing one's bed with cats is that they'd rather sleep on you than beside you.

Music speaks of Platonic truth - the ideal river rather than the polluted reality, love as we dream it rather than we experience it, grief noble and uplifting rather than our distracted weeping. It is necessary to our survival and our sanity.

Becoming a grandmother is wonderful. One moment you're just a mother. The next you are all-wise and prehistoric.

Dads are most ordinary men turned by love into heroes, adventurers, story-tellers, singers of songs.

We shared. Parents. Home. Pets. Celebrations. Catastrophes. Secrets. And the threads of our experience became so interwoven that we are linked. I can never be utterly lonely, knowing you share the planet.

For sheer excitement you can keep movie premieres and roller-coasters . An empty white canvas waiting to be filled. That's the thing.